PHOENIX β The head of the Arizona Republican Party is making a last-minute plea to a member of the U.S. Supreme Court in her attempt to have the stateβs electoral votes go to President Trump rather than to Joe Biden, who won the stateβs popular vote.
βWe are asking that our case go straight to the justice in charge of the Fifth Circuit,β Kelli Ward said on Monday in a Twitter post to followers.
She figures that going directly to Justice Samuel Alito and asking him to immediately bar Vice President Mike Pence from following the procedures in the federal Electoral Count Act might get her what she wants, which both a trial judge and the Fifth Circuit refused to provide.
Going to Alito also could speed up the process, something crucial for Ward and her allies as Congress meets Wednesday, Jan. 6, with Pence presiding, to count the electoral votes.
Ward contends the Electoral Count Act does not comply with the U.S. Constitution. She wants Alito to order Pence to follow a different process, one where Trump would have an edge.
βThat gets away from us having to file and wait for all nine justices to weigh in,β Ward said. βAnd it really expedites the process.β
But whether Alito is willing to act on his own and void the Electoral Count Act is questionable at best.
In fact, the full Supreme Court has turned away various prior challenges to the result of the November election. And the justices have declined to expedite two other cases on their docket, both involving Ward.
All this comes two days after the Fifth Circuit ruled that Ward, the other 10 would-be Arizona Republican βelectorsβ and Republican U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas lack legal standing to challenge that federal law.
The judges, all appointed to the appellate bench by Republican presidents β including one tapped three years ago by President Trump β declined to say who, if anyone, might have standing to challenge the 1887 law that governs how Congress is required to deal with the electoral votes and a move by any federal lawmakers to contest the votes of any state.
Absent intervention now by Alito or the full U.S. Supreme Court, Congress will meet on Wednesday to count the electoral votes which, according to results already certified by the states and upheld by various state and federal courts, would affirm that Biden is the next president, with 306 electoral votes against 232 for the incumbent.
Photos: 2020 General Election in Pima County and Arizona
Ballot processing in Pima County
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UpdatedBallot processing in Pima County
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UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
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UpdatedElection 2020 Senate Kelly
UpdatedElection 2020 Senate Kelly
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
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UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
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UpdatedElection 2020 Arizona Voting
UpdatedElection 2020 Arizona Voting
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UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
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UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
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UpdatedElection 2020 Arizona Voting
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UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
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UpdatedElection 2020 Arizona Voting
UpdatedElection 2020 Arizona Voting
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
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UpdatedElection 2020 Arizona Voting
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedElection Day, Pima County and Arizona, 2020
UpdatedJudge throws out lawsuit, finds no fraud or misconduct in Arizona election
UpdatedPHOENIX β A judge tossed out a bid by the head of the Arizona Republican Party to void the election results that awarded the stateβs 11 electoral votes to Democrat Joe Biden.
The two days of testimony produced in the case brought by GOP Chairwoman Kelli Ward produced no evidence of fraud or misconduct in how the vote was conducted in Maricopa County, said Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Randall Warner in his Friday ruling.
Warner acknowledged that there were some human errors made when ballots that could not be read by machines due to marks or other problems were duplicated by hand.
But he said that a random sample of those duplicated ballots showed an accuracy rate of 99.45%.
Warner said there was no evidence that the error rate, even if extrapolated to all the 27,869 duplicated ballots, would change the fact that Biden beat President Trump.
The judge also threw out charges that there were illegal votes based on claims that the signatures on the envelopes containing early ballots were not properly compared with those already on file.
He pointed out that a forensic document examiner hired by Wardβs attorney reviewed 100 of those envelopes.
And at best, Warner said, that examiner found six signatures to be βinconclusive,β meaning she could not testify that they were a match to the signature on file.
But the judge said this witness found no signs of forgery.
Finally, Warner said, there was no evidence that the vote count was erroneous. So he issued an order confirming the Arizona election, which Biden won with a 10,457-vote edge over Trump.
Federal court case remains to be heard
Fridayβs ruling, however, is not the last word.
Ward, in anticipation of the case going against her, already had announced she plans to seek review by the Arizona Supreme Court.
And a separate lawsuit is playing out in federal court, which includes some of the same claims made here along with allegations of fraud and conspiracy.
That case, set for a hearing Tuesday, also seeks to void the results of the presidential contest.
It includes allegations that the Dominion Software voting equipment used by Maricopa County is unreliable and was programmed to register more votes for Biden than he actually got.
Legislative leaders call for audit but not to change election results
Along the same lines, Senate President Karen Fann and House Speaker Rusty Bowers on Friday called for an independent audit of the software and equipment used by Maricopa County in the just-completed election.
βThere have been questions,β Fann said.
But she told Capitol Media Services it is not their intent to use whatever is found to overturn the results of the Nov. 3 election.
In fact, she said nothing in the Republican legislative leadersβ request for the inquiry alleges there are any βirregularitiesβ in the way the election was conducted.
βAt the very least, the confidence in our electoral system has been shaken because of a lot of claims and allegations,β Fann said. βSo our No. 1 goal is to restore the confidence of our voters.β
Bowers specifically rejected calls by the Trump legal team that the Legislature come into session to void the election results, which were formally certified on Monday.
βThe rule of law forbids us to do that,β he said.
In fact, Bowers pointed out, it was the Republican-controlled Legislature that enacted a law three years ago specifically requiring the stateβs electors βto cast their votes for the candidates who received the most votes in the official statewide canvass.β
He said that was done because Hillary Clinton had won the popular vote nationwide in 2016 and some lawmakers feared that electors would refuse to cast the stateβs 11 electoral votes for Trump, who won Arizonaβs race that year.
βAs a conservative Republican, I donβt like the results of the presidential election,β Bowers said in a prepared statement. βBut I cannot and will not entertain a suggestion that we violate current law to change the outcome of a certified election.β
Photos of the 2020 General Election voting, election night and ballot processing in Pima County, Maricopa County and throughout Arizona.